


here's looking at you kid; hard to forget

by eclectictsunami



Category: Velvet Goldmine
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-10
Updated: 2018-11-10
Packaged: 2019-08-21 11:46:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16575842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eclectictsunami/pseuds/eclectictsunami
Summary: Arthur's always the brave one.





	here's looking at you kid; hard to forget

**Author's Note:**

> Set immediately post-movie. I guess it can take place in the same universe as my other fic, Five Days, but both stand on their own.  
> Many thanks to @thegirlwiththemousey hair for her encouragement, and for loving these two as much as I do.

The pin falls into his mouth, almost choking him, and Arthur laughs. Lets it fall into the palm of his hand and shuts his eyes, shoulders shaking.

_What do you call this?_

_Astonishing._ That must be the word. It’s the only word he can find.

He turns the pin over and over in his hand, slowly, startling when he feels it prick the pad of his thumb.

_It belonged to Oscar Wilde._

He thinks there must be some sort of balance in the scales, to feel so much rushing back, in this moment, when he’s done so much cutting of himself off over the years, like a wave that can only be pushed back for so long, before -

Just, before.

That indecision quivering in his stomach, the child’s voice that says _if you leave now, maybe you can still catch him_ \- warring with the desire to just live in this moment, keep it something perfect and sealed away, just like that night, unmarred and unspoiled by that crash of reality. Keep it where it is.

Distantly, he wonders if he’d be able to fit the pin through the hole in his ear, or if it’s closed up too much. It’s been years, ages, since he wore an earring. He thinks it must have hurt, that night when Malcolm did it, the slice of apple behind his ear, that clumsy stab of the needle, but he doesn’t remember that part. He remembers how swollen it had looked the next day, how it had gotten infected, red and pulsing and too-hot and only healing after weeks of flushing it with salt water. But that night, all he can remember is how they’d laughed. It was such a small thing, and it had felt like such a victory.

He wonders if there’s a way to write about this, the pull of this moment, that inexorable drag back and back and back into a world he’d tried to strip bare of feeling and color. A way to make these pieces smaller and easier to understand, to create a narrative around himself that would give some kind of explanation, some kind of perspective, but -

All he can feel is the taste of beer in his mouth, and the sting on his thumb, and if he closes his eyes he thinks he can still hear him, so close.

And he gets up, knocking the bottle over as he gets to his feet, and he runs.

He runs down every street, around every corner that he can think of. He runs himself in circles, and then he runs them again. His mind is a blissful blank; there are no words or rationalizations, just the beat of his heart with his feet pounding on the pavement. He runs until his breath comes out in shallow, wheezing laughs, steaming in the cold New York air.

It’s when he’s given up, turned to head home, somehow still giddy even in his mounting disappointment, that - there he is.

Of course he is.

There’s nowhere he could turn up that his presence would somehow be a surprise.

Arthur knows him immediately just from the curve of his body where he’s tucked against the brick wall. Hears the flick of his lighter and sees a flash of his face in the glow, just for a second.

“I was starting to think you weren’t coming,” he says.

“Didn’t realize you wanted me to follow,” Arthur returns. His voice sounds too high and breathless to his own ears.

Curt laughs around the cigarette in his mouth. “Yes, you did.”

“Maybe,” he admits. Would he have come if he thought he was unwelcome? He hadn’t thought much about it either way. For once in his life, he’d hardly thought about anything at all.

_Come closer._

Arthur steals a few more steps.

Curt holds a cigarette out in wordless offering, and Arthur takes it, grateful to have something to do with his hands. Watches him in little sidelong glances as he lights it. He was always good at looking without being seen in return. They smoke in silence for a moment, and Arthur has the queerest urge to rest his head on Curt’s shoulder; he’s nearly close enough, wouldn’t have to do anything other than just let his head fall…

“And after all the trouble you went to to track me down,” Curt sighs.

Arthur swallows, nerves rising up again to quiver in his gut. “The pin was a good way to get me to follow, then,” he manages. “If you thought I’d return it.”

“Not why I gave it to you.”

 _Why did you?_ Arthur doesn’t ask. What came over him in that moment, what whim led him to giving that pin to a nosy journalist in a bar, what tipping point hit him at that exact moment? Was it a gift for a fan? A consolation prize for not giving him a better story, a way to make his escape with an air of mystery trailing behind him? Had he simply been desperate to get rid of the thing, and Arthur had been the first person to come close enough? Did it just not mean much of anything to him, after all?

“I almost didn’t,” Arthur says. He pushes down the shiver in his voice, but can’t quite hide it in his hands. Something always gives him away; now he’s sweaty-palmed like a lovesick kid. “Follow, I mean.” He clears his throat. “You didn’t make it easy,” he adds, trying to sound light.

“I never do,” Curt mutters. “But here you are.”

Arthur hates him a little in that moment, for being able to walk away still knowing he’d be followed. Didn’t even have to say a word, this time, to beckon Arthur back and lead him on a chase. Arthur fucking _ran after him_.

“Here I am,” he agrees, and it comes out just a little bit bitter.

Curt lets his cigarette drop to the ground. He moves the same hand up to touch Arthur’s elbow, lightly, as though he’s trying not to startle him away. His head is ducked down a little, and Arthur suddenly realizes that he’s taller than Curt is, even more so now that he’s standing over him, and how had he never noticed that before? Had he always remembered Curt as being so much bigger than he was? He took up so little space now. He’d be so easy to touch.

“I don’t think you’d want me to make it easy,” Curt says, soft.

“Maybe I would,” Arthur says, and his voice is shaking now, with anger and something else. “Maybe I don’t like chasing - “ He swallows again, harder, and shuts his eyes around it. This isn’t fair, it isn’t fair for him to bring something else into this; Curt’s looking to get laid, maybe, or he wants to feel desired, or maybe he just wants to fuck with somebody’s head, but even if he is just being a dick Arthur shouldn’t be getting this worked up about it, should just take this easy and be normal for once, play whatever game this is or else just let it go -

“I didn’t go far, anyway,” Curt says. Arthur looks at him. Curt’s stare is so close, so frank, and feeling the force of it on him nearly cuts him off at the knees. _You did go far,_ Arthur thinks, _you went all the way across the world and over these last ten years, you made me follow over and over even when I didn’t want to chase you, even when I thought I’d long since let you go._

“You look better,” Curt says, abruptly. His voice suddenly sounds too loud.

“Better?” Arthur echoes, dumb.

“Without all the blue shit in your hair,” Curt clarifies. Gestures vaguely around Arthur’s head; Arthur is pretty sure his mouth is hanging open. “I mean, it was kind of cute, but you look better without it.”

“You - “ Arthur is gasping. His insides are writhing, heart beating so fast he can feel the pounding of it in his head, and he nearly does fall forward then, just collapse onto Curt’s chest with absolute disbelief - “I didn’t - I never thought.” He shakes his head. Can’t be sure that what he’s hearing is really -

“What?” Curt says. His mouth is turned up in a smile, one Arthur hasn’t seen in ten years but has never forgotten, “you think I give that pin to all the boys I meet on rooftops?”

Arthur’s breath comes out of him in a laugh, slightly hysterical. “Jesus Christ,” he whispers. “Jesus Christ, I didn’t expect - I wasn’t interviewing you to - to -“ He has no idea how to finish that sentence. Has no idea how to say _I never thought you’d remember me_ without sounding like an idiot, like that wide-eyed kid who’d gazed up at him with adoration, like he’d never grown past that and become a _fucking_ adult, who could look back on that night with some actual distance and a clear head, but he’s pretty sure his knees are about to give out, and he can’t, this is too much for one night, he _can’t._

“I wasn’t sure at first,” Curt says. “Your hair, and…I don’t know. It was a long time ago, you know.”

“Right. Yeah.” Arthur knows. A lifetime away for him, a second away, too, but -

“But it was, I don’t know. Death of Glitter, it was…” he shrugs, and Arthur realizes with utter amazement that, impossibly, Curt looks lost for words, too - “I don’t know. I didn’t think I’d…” He runs a hand through his hair and sighs, jittery and sharp. “I don’t know. I thought it was pretty obvious I meant for you to follow me. I wanted…” His gaze meets Arthur’s, and his eyes are intent and wide. “I meant for you to follow me,” he concludes, and shrugs.

“Okay,” Arthur whispers. He doesn’t remember moving closer, but it seems he’s being pulled forward, again, just like always. “Yeah. Okay.”

Curt’s shoulders relax right away, going softer, more open.

“Okay,” Arthur says again. He goes to reach out a hand toward Curt’s face, hesitantly, only to have him flinch away from the touch. Stung, he draws back, but Curt grabs back on to his hand and holds it, almost too tight.

Unaccountably, unbearably fond, Arthur squeezes back before releasing it.

“You live around here?” Curt asks gruffly. His head has ducked again, his gaze somewhere near the ground.

“Yeah, not too far.” It’s a shitty little studio, and he’s been mugged in his neighborhood twice, but he’s not scared to seen bringing guys back there and that’s enough. “Do you.” He clears his throat, knows it’s absurd to still fear rejection at this point, but. “Do you want to…?”

“Yeah,” Curt says, almost cutting him off with the swiftness of his reply.

Arthur wants a thousand things in that moment, in that precarious second where Curt is looking at him, ready to follow. He wants to grab on to him and drag him home to his bed before he can change his mind; wants to fuck him savage and senseless against that brick wall in some sort of revenge; wants to throw that acceptance back in his face and leave him there rejected and humiliated. He wants to kiss him until he can’t breathe. He wants to freeze time and just stay here, in this moment, where neither of them can fuck it up. He wants to never let the real world in again.

“C’mon then,” he manages finally, jerking his head to the side. “’S this way.”

Curt follows this time.

**Author's Note:**

> (Curt effectively moves in to Arthur's apartment within the month. He doesn't actually admit he's living there for another year.)


End file.
